


Crash into Me

by Starbird



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bedsharing, Cassian Self-Angst, Cassian is Badly in Love with Jyn and Doesn’t Even Know How Bad It Is, Damn It's Cold, Denial of Feelings, Effing Hoth, F/M, I Made that Term Up but What I Mean is Cassian’s Head is Not a Happy Place, Inspired by this Terrible Weather, Kissing, Light Angst, Lots of kissing, Made-up Spaceship Stuff, Non-Explicit Sex, Oral Sex, POV Cassian Andor, Resolved Sexual Tension, Self-Hatred, Semi-Public Sex, Sexual Frustration, Sharing a Bed, Sharing a Cockpit Floor More Like, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Well Now It's Resolved Sexual Tension Because I Wrote a Second Part, Wet Dream, sex with feelings, so much UST, sorta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-05
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-02-28 19:47:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13278609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starbird/pseuds/Starbird
Summary: When their ship’s engines malfunction, Jyn and Cassian get stranded overnight in the snowy wasteland of Hoth.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [skitzofreak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skitzofreak/gifts), [jenniferjun1per](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenniferjun1per/gifts).



> This work is inspired by the fact that it feels like kriffing Hoth outside right now. Ughghhghg bring back Yavin 4 weather!!
> 
> Dedicated to [skitzofreak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/skitzofreak/pseuds/skitzofreak) because of our conversation about song lyrics as fic titles, and [jenniferjuniper](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenniferjun1per/pseuds/jenniferjun1per) because she loves Hoth fics. <3 you both.<3
> 
> Also, I made up some spaceship stuff here. Ignore it. It’s been awhile since I’ve read the X-wing books, so I don’t remember much about how ships work.

It has been two and a half years since Scarif.

Two and a half weeks since Cassian has dreamed of Jyn.

Two and a half hours since he last thought of her. He’s been asleep since then.

Tonight, his dreams are not faceless darkness. They aren’t fear and death and him crying out, voiceless, powerless against impending pain and doom. They’re not guilt and loss and terror. They’re not pain he can feel even though he’s unconscious and dreaming.

Tonight, he won’t wake up with a cry and bolt upright in bed, gasping for air and covered in a cold sweat that freezes deeper when he remembers he’s on Force-forsaken Hoth.

Tonight, he dreams of quiet.

It doesn’t make much sense. He and Jyn are in a market on a planet he doesn’t know, amongst humans and aliens alike, and the images are clear and the sky is blue. He feels relaxed. Jyn is complaining about the price of produce, and he says nothing. He is aware he’s dreaming, and he wants to stay here forever.

He still has a blaster strapped to his side. He probably always will.

They leave the market (Jyn buys nothing), and they’re suddenly in a sparse room with a window that lets in the bright sun. He doesn’t feel trapped. He’s with Jyn, and he is free. He’s always free with her. Jyn does nothing more than smile and lean into him, and he embraces her tightly and lays his cheek on her hair. He can _feel_ it, the real memory coming through the veil of unconsciousness. She separates from him, only long enough to look into his eyes and lean forward once more, capturing his lips with hers. He presses her down as their kissing intensifies, and her knees widen just enough to allow him to fit between them. He moves against her and it’s good, even in the dream, and suddenly a tide of pleasure builds up and overcomes him and peaks sharply –

Cassian’s eyes fly open and air rushes into his lungs. His heart is beating hard, and he’s shaking. The air is never quite warm enough to feel comfortable, and his body quickly cools down. He raises a hand first to his forehead before closing his eyes again and pulling his hand down his face.

He’s alone tonight. Jyn is conducting a training exercise on night tactics. She must be freezing, and he can’t help but worry about her. She doesn’t need his worry, but he does so anyway. When she’s finished, he hopes she’ll come to his quarters. She doesn’t always, but it’s frequent enough that if he hopes hard enough, sometimes it happens.

Cassian has always believed in hope.

With a sigh, he sits up, swings his legs over the side of the bunk, and goes to his makeshift dresser to get a new pair of sleeping pants and underwear.

 _What a mess,_ he thinks as he changes. _All of it._ It’s been two and a half years since they stole the Death Star plans, and in that time, he and Jyn have remained close, but never crossed that final boundary. They trust each other implicitly. They seek each other out constantly. They rely on each other, and they respect each other. They defend each other and would kill in an instant for the other (they already have in the past).

They’ve kissed each other.

Cassian lays back down in his bunk and stares at the ceiling for a moment, trying not to let his mind wander to those stolen moments. Trying to force it back to sleep.

The first time was in the turbolift on Scarif. It had been soft, and weak, and they’d both been in pain and it hadn’t been much.

It hadn’t been much, but it had been everything.

After they’d survived, they’d stayed in one another’s orbit. The rebels had blown up the Death Star, and they’d embraced then. Later, after the celebration, as they sat on the roof of the temple and watched the pieces of the Death Star rain down through the atmosphere as shooting stars, the shadows stretching out over them, it had happened again. When he’d walked her to her quarters, he’d said goodnight, and that had been that.

The rebels had left Yavin 4 shortly after and moved around for a couple years until settling on the miserable iceball that was Hoth. The Rogue One crew had stayed together and been sent out on missions as a group, but from time to time Jyn and Cassian went out on their own missions – and sometimes Cassian went out alone (he didn’t like to think about those).

Sometime during those early years, Jyn had started coming to Cassian’s quarters.

It had started out as comfort, mostly, as they’d begun to talk about their pasts and the nightmares they had. Neither of them asked for the company – they were both too proud and stubborn, and for Cassian’s part, he didn’t want to give Jyn the wrong impression – so it didn’t happen as often as Cassian would have liked. The nights Jyn was in the small bed with him were the nights he slept the best. She curved her body along his, allowed him to rest his arm over her waist or to clutch her shoulder, and she held him close when his nightmares became too real. (He did the same for her. Of course he did.)

One of those times – he didn’t remember whose nightmare – he had put his hand on her face, brushed sweaty hair away because the planet they were staying on was in its warm season and the two of them in that small bunk was warm – and kissed her hard. He wasn’t supposed to – he knew he wasn’t supposed to – but he couldn’t help it.

Jyn kissed him back.

He’d slowed the kiss down, and eventually, they’d fallen asleep, foreheads pressed together and hands clasped.

It had been too long since they’d last kissed. Too long since she’d come to his quarters.

Before Jyn, Cassian had gone months – years, even – without touch. He was touch-starved, dying slowly from lack of it, and he knew it. He didn’t care, back then. It didn’t matter. His needs were always last, and he was fine with that. Now that Jyn Erso was in his life, though, going even a few days without her was too much.

She had too much of him, Cassian realized.

Then again, comes the next thought as he turns over, she always had.

* * *

They have a mission to fly together in the late afternoon the following day. They both are tied up with commitments until then, so the time passes quickly. The ship, however, refuses to cooperate, and Cassian does his best to keep busy while the techs comm him updates on its status, more and more time slipping by. Finally, hours later, they clear it to fly just as Hoth is getting dark. Cassian comms Jyn to let her know the ship is ready, and he heads over to the hangar. He’s already standing over the controls, warming up the ship, when she arrives.

“Looks like it’ll barely make it out of here,” Jyn comments by way of greeting, dropping her bag on the floor of the cockpit. Cassian looks up from the controls. She looks…pretty. Her face is flushed from the sudden heat in the ship after being out in the cold, and strands of her dark hair escape her hood and curve around her face. She is swathed head to toe in cold weather gear, which she immediately starts stripping off.

“How has training been going?” Cassian asks. Jyn shrugs and sinks down into the copilot’s seat.

“Better than expected,” she says. “No one likes the cold. No one likes the dark.” She pauses and doesn’t look at him, her hand drifting over the console. “Can’t say I blame them.”

“Still, good skills to have.”

“Mm.”

Cassian flips a couple switches above his head, sits in the pilot’s seat, and puts on his headset. He toggles the comm. “Echo Base, this is shuttle seven-three-six, requesting clearance for departure.”

The base clears them, and they fly out of the hangar. Hoth’s skies have grown darker, and snow blows in every direction. Cassian squints out the viewscreen, and the ship gives a concerning shudder.

“This thing is not going to make it in space,” he says. “We can’t even see through this storm anyway. We’re going to have to abort.”

“Agreed,” Jyn says. “We’ll go back, get something warm to drink, turn in, and try again tomorrow.” Her tone is light, but her gaze is focused intently out the viewscreen.

Cassian arcs the ship around in a loop to point them back toward base. Just as they are coming out of the loop, the ship gives a final shudder, and the lights flicker once, and then go out. The craft lurches violently, slamming Jyn and Cassian against their crash restraints, and half a dozen alarms blare. The auxiliary power cuts in, and Cassian fights to keep the ship level as the storm buffets it around, the engines and compensators completely gone. The ground rises up to meet them, and Cassian grits his teeth as he struggles with the controls.

They go down fast and slam into a snowbank, the whole ship rattling with the impact. The lights blink again, then go off for good. Emergency lighting comes on and glows dimly.

Cassian lets out a breath and looks over at Jyn. She is already looking back at him, and appears unhurt. “You okay?” he asks. She nods.

“Good. You?”

“I’ve survived worse.” He hits the release on his crash restraints and stands.

“Eadu,” Jyn says as she unstraps.

“Exactly.”

Cassian moves out of the cockpit to inspect the damage.

He doesn’t like what he sees.

The door has gotten jammed a good meter open, and snow swirls in. The ship is small, cramped, and only has the little cockpit and the tiny cargo area.

_This isn’t good._

He knows better than to say it, though. Speaking dark words out loud only makes a situation worse. Plus, Jyn already has to know.

Cassian crosses the cargo bay and opens a crate that had been shoved in the corner by techs earlier. Secured to a wall above it is a medpack he’d already checked earlier and knows to be fresh and full, and below it, in the crate, are blankets and provisions. He pulls the thick blankets out and brings them back to the cockpit.

“If we could find a way to seal up that gap, that would go a long way,” he says, hands on his hips as he looks out at the storm from the cargo bay. “I just don’t think we can.”

“I suppose we could hang a blanket,” Jyn says, “but I doubt it’s going to do much good. It’ll only keep the snow out for so long, and we’d have better use of it ourselves.”

Cassian nods and lets his hands drop, worry starting to settle down in his gut. He’s never been stuck in a snowstorm before. He’s trained for the scenario, but it has been a long time since that. “We should get back to the cockpit. Stay together, try not to move much.”

“I don’t suppose there’s a portable heater,” Jyn says as she turns back to the cockpit.

“No, of course not,” he says wryly.

They redress in their winter gear and settle on the floor. They don’t talk much – they’ve always been comfortable with each other’s silent presences – and the time passes slowly. After a while, Cassian begins to feel drowsy, and he thinks, with some absurd part of his mind, that at least he’ll get to sleep as much as he’d like tonight. They have nowhere to be, nowhere they _can_ be. He’s already tried comming for help, but the storm has scrambled the signal too badly. He set it to repeat the message and hopes that it will get through before they freeze to death.

What a terrible end that would be, he thinks, for them to have survived everything they’d been through only to die on this horrible backwater iceball because their damn ship malfunctioned.

Cassian catches himself nodding off, and at one point, wakes to find Jyn’s head on his shoulder. The night has gotten colder, flakes of snow occasionally drifting into the cockpit, and he grabs the second blanket.

“Jyn,” he murmurs. She stirs and lifts her head, and they readjust so they’re lying together under both blankets, their whole bodies covered by the thick material with only their heads outside it.

It actually, Cassian reflects, isn’t that bad.

He lays on his back, and Jyn settles on his chest.

She’s never done that before.

Cassian feels uncomfortable having her here like this, in this situation he’s put them in. He’d _known_ the ship was acting up. He should have done something about it! But he hadn’t. He’d screwed up.

_Of course I’d screwed up._

Cassian sighs and runs a gloved hand down his face. Now he doesn’t feel like sleeping at all. Now, he feels like running every single one of his screw-ups over in his mind.

Jyn stirs again, pushing up gently from his chest to look into his eyes. “What’s wrong?” she asks.

“I messed this one up,” he says. “I knew the ship wasn’t working right. I just wanted to get our mission underway.”

“It’s not your fault,” Jyn says. “It’s the weather. Nothing’s adapting right.”

Cassian looks up at the ceiling of the cockpit. “Sure.”

“Don’t beat yourself up over this, Cassian,” she says gently. “I know how you are.”

His eyes cut to hers at her kind tone. She _could_ be kind, battle-hardened as she was. Kind, and soft, and so many other things most people didn’t see.

She is too good for him. He knows that. He doesn’t deserve her. He never has. Perhaps that is why he never had her, why she was never his, why she never _could_ be his.

Cassian doesn’t say anything. Jyn is right, but he doesn’t believe her anyway.

Jyn tugs off a glove and lifts her hand to his face, brushing his bangs back. “You look so worried.”

“I am,” he says. “I don’t want us to die.”

His tone is harsher than he means it to be.

He just couldn’t live with himself if something happened to Jyn.

Jyn pulls herself closer to him and breathes out, warm against his face.

“I wasn’t all that sold on this mission anyway,” she says, and she is too close, oh, she is way too close, and Cassian wants to back away from her. She is too close and she shouldn’t be. He wants her that close, but every time she is, he fears she will be sucked in by his darkness, disappear inside him and never emerge or be the same. That he’ll darken her, taint her, with his touch and with his being.

She needs to stay away. Cassian knows that. Everyone needs to stay away from him.

But, Force, if he doesn’t crave her touch and her presence. It has been a long time since he’s had a real friend, since he’s had a sentient being who truly cared about him, and his body is starved for touch.

If he touches her, he’s afraid he’ll never let go.

“You look so worried,” Jyn says again, her other hand bare and on the other side of his face.

She is too close and –

Cassian’s eyes close as hers do, too, because she is closing the small space between them and kissing him. It is good, it is so good, her lips soft and heavenly. The kiss is soft, short, and when it ends, he says, “Jyn – ” because she needs to know that she doesn’t need to do this (it is just so different from before; something about it is different), but she cuts him off.

“Kiss me, Cassian,” she whispers.

And just like that she trips the trigger in him, because he can’t deny her and he wants this so badly. He rips his gloves off and one hand slides into her hair as he lifts himself up off the floor, his mouth colliding with hers. Together they lay back down, and he can’t stop himself from the way he’s kissing her. He kisses her like this is their last night together, like he will never see her again, like he will never touch her again. And maybe it is, and maybe he won’t. He doesn’t know. But what he does know is that he has held himself in check all these years, living his wishes out through snatches of dreams here or there, guilty moments in the solitude of his room when he begged the universe for her touch but had only his own. She is here, now, and she is warm and soft and she is kissing him back.

Jyn breaks from his lips and nudges his face aside with her chin. Cassian gasps almost inaudibly as she presses her burning lips to his pulse point right below his ear, then moves them down his throat. His fingers dig into her shoulders, and this isn’t how he kisses somebody, or lets them kiss him. He knows better. He is no stranger to physical intimacy – he’s been there enough times, though the emotional side has always left him colder than if he’d never been physically intimate at all – and he knows how to touch and be touched.

He has never, however, been touched by someone who truly cared.

Jyn Erso truly cared.

His body reacts, his blood warming way too much from just simple kissing. He is desperate to feel more of Jyn’s skin, and he viciously curses this awful planet for preventing him from touching her. He aches for her, aches in the worst, most painful way, and she is right there and he can’t touch her.

It might be for the best, though, he reasons, as Jyn kisses the crook of his neck. Maybe this is all Jyn wants. He shouldn’t try to take advantage of her, just because he can’t get himself under control.

Force, she feels good. She feels good and she tastes good. She _is_ good. She is everything good about the universe to him.

Jyn’s mouth hovers over his, her breaths coming just a little bit faster. Their clothes are bulky, and they have the blanket over them, but she is still able to maneuver her body in between his legs. Cassian hisses – part in shame and part in pleasure – when the weight of her hips presses down against his. Even through all of that clothing, he can feel the friction against his groin, hard and painful and longing for her.

It is too much.

Not thinking, he raises his knees, but that only brings her hips tighter against his. Force, if he can survive this, he can survive anything. Jyn shifts, causing him more agonizing friction, and she kisses him again. He loses himself in it, and he turns them over, hands grabbing at her coat and mind cursing endless streams at the universe for this cold weather. He kisses her neck harder than she’d kissed his, and he feels his control slipping and switches to cursing himself briefly when his teeth sink into the skin at the crook of her neck. _Kriff, Andor, stop!_ his mind screams. But her arms only wrap tighter around his shoulders. He sucks at the spot while his hands wander. Her coat falls down only past her hips, and Cassian’s hand finds its way up under it and to the waistband of her pants. His fingers untuck her shirt and flick it to the side, and her breath catches as his cold hand finally, _finally_ makes contact with her skin.

“I hate,” he says, “this _kriffing_ weather.”

“I hate this whole kriffing planet,” Jyn replies. Her hand seeks his out under her coat, grasping his wrist as he splays his fingers across her lower abdomen, wanting to feel more of her. She sighs out a long breath. She is as touch-starved as he.

Cassian opens his eyes. Jyn is below him and she’s beautiful. His mind immediately conjures up the images he’s had of her for so long, of her below him as he moves within her, making love to her so sweetly, so gently, like she’s never had, because who would have ever been kind to her in the past? He would. Cassian would. He always would. Sometimes, though, he would guiltily imagine taking her quickly, because he had just seen her and she’d touched him and he’d gone back to his quarters, and the pressure in his body was too much and he’d wanted nothing more than to be deep inside her, behind her, passionately making love to her until they both collapsed, exhausted, on the bed.

He always felt empty afterward. Empty, and alone.

Cassian’s mouth finds Jyn’s again, and she’s grasping his coat and pulling him against her as his hand caresses her abdomen. It’s all he can reach…though if he were to rotate his hand, point his fingers downward, he could easily slide into her pants, touch her _there_ , touch her where he’d die to be.

Still kissing him, Jyn undoes the fasteners on the front of his coat, and it’s hot enough under the blanket that he’s burning up and doesn’t mind the rush of cold air that hits him when she parts the thick material. Underneath he’s wearing another jacket, a shirt, and a thermal undershirt, but Jyn makes quick work of untucking all of these and thrusting her cold hands under them and against his skin. His muscles twitch, jumping away from the frigidity of her skin, and she pulls her hands away to blow on them. Then she gently puts them back on his skin, and she caresses him.

There’s so much clothing between them. Too much. Cassian fists her coat, gripping too hard and moaning against her mouth as she breathes his name into his. He dies a little to hear it, because no one has ever done that before. He’s heard his last name before like that – he’s never liked it – but the way Jyn says his first name is so beautiful. He’s never even liked his name – it’s always been tied to hateful things, and misery, and he’s hardly even used it throughout his life anyway – but it’s beautiful on Jyn’s tongue.

He whispers her name back.

As she touches him, he loses more and more of his control, and he pushes against her. He’s glad for all the layers now so she can’t feel how turned on he is – she doesn’t need to know – but being able to press his body against hers feels so good. When they’ve exhausted themselves, too tired to continue, they hold each other in the cold night under the heavy blankets, and they’re warm enough. The mission will have to be postponed, and they don’t know how long it’ll be before someone rescues them, but for now, Cassian is happy.

It’s a strange feeling. He isn’t sure how he feels about it.

What he does know is that he wouldn’t want to be stuck in a blizzard on a frozen planet with anyone else, and Jyn, it seems, feels quite the same.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This may end up getting a second part....
> 
> I'm @thestarbirdfromtheashes on Tumblr!


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jyn and Cassian return to base, and they find they can’t stay away from one another.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YUP. It ended up getting a second part. I really only meant for this fic to be a one-shot, but the UST got me a bit frustrated and I couldn’t just let it go or leave well enough alone so…I resolved it. This is just bonus material? I guess? I don’t know what to call it.

Cassian doesn’t know when the storm winds down. He wakes in the morning to sun and silence across the snowy wasteland, with Jyn tucked in at his side.

The comm is beeping.

He shifts a waking Jyn aside and stands to answer it. “Andor.”

“This is Rogue Two,” the voice says. “I’ve got your location.”

“Good to hear. We’re looking forward to going home.”

A ship zooms by overhead, then comes back around. Cassian makes his way out of their ship to see a snowspeeder hovering near the wreck. He waves at the pilot, Zev Senesca.

An hour later, they’re all back at base. Draven reschedules the mission, and Jyn and Cassian are free to go.

The walk through the chilly corridors is silent, but Cassian feels heat inside him, feels it between him and Jyn, and his chest is so tight he can barely breathe. He doesn’t dare look at Jyn.

When his quarters come up, he keys in the code. He still doesn’t look at her – he doesn’t want to break whatever it is between them right now – and steps into the room. He leaves the door open.

Jyn follows. She closes the door.

Cassian turns. They’re in each other’s arms in seconds, pulling again at collars. Jyn curls her hand around the back of his neck and kisses the hollow of his throat, and his fingers are at the fasteners of her coat, undoing each one as quickly as he can. He can’t bear to not touch her a moment longer. Jyn’s hands go to his coat, too, and soon, they’re pushing each other’s off to the floor. Cassian shucks off his jacket and pulls his two shirts over his head while Jyn does the same. Her bare arms wrap around him and pull him close, the feeling of so much of her skin against his so incredible that his mind momentarily blanks. His arms are at her back, hands working to unfasten her breastband. His fingers, usually so adept and nimble in the field, fumble like a teenager’s, and he buries his face in the crook of her neck as his hands shake and he feels a wash of embarrassment. He can’t get the small clasps undone, and it’s not because of the cold.

Cassian has been dying for this moment. It’s happening too fast, but he doesn’t know how to slow them down. He wants slowness for her, wants to take his time, wants to do everything intimate with her, but it’s as if neither of them can wait to get there, to the point of no return. They’re naked, and her body is beautiful, and Cassian wants to touch every bit of it. Jyn reaches for him, closes her hand around him, and he involuntarily hisses and jerks away.

“Did I hurt you?” she asks.

Cassian is a fool. Her touch is anything _but_ painful. “No,” he says, shame flooding him. The truth is that it’s been too long for him, and her touch is liable to send him over the edge, ending him before he can even begin. He’s too close already – just being this sexual with a woman, and worse, _Jyn, it’s Jyn_ , threatens to finish him. He’s repressed his sexuality for so long, for his whole life, only opening himself up to it when he’s absolutely had to, when it’s slithered through the vault he’s locked it in, and he’s been forced to address it. It’s never been something he’s been able to enjoy. But Jyn…Jyn…Jyn…. He wants this so badly, wants not to screw it up and humiliate himself and make it awful for her. He doesn’t even know if he’s ever even satisfied anybody in the past. He’s never asked, and no one has ever given him feedback. It’s never been important. It’s never been necessary. It just wasn’t done, not with someone he never planned to sleep with ever again (and the same for his partner). Moans, whimpers, pleas for him, things cried out in the heat of the moment are all he’s ever had to go on, weighing them against the doubts in his mind.

Cassian wants this to be different. For years he’s dreamed of it being different for once. While he’s been attentive to other partners, the act has never meant anything. It’s always been stress relief, blowing off steam, getting off because the pressure’s been too much.

“It’s been awhile,” he says to Jyn, apologetic.

Jyn lets her fingers drift along his length, sighing against his lips as she does so.

She’s so gentle. How is she this gentle with him?

She gathers him to her, pressing her hips against his. She wants him, she _wants_ him. Cassian doesn’t know what to do – he knows they should make it over to the bed, behind them – but every nerve in his body is sparking and he can’t think right. Jyn’s back is against the wall – it’s vulnerable of her, and she lets it happen, _with him_ – and Cassian hoists her up to him. Her legs wrap around his lower back and her arms tangle around his neck. She’s kissing him and it’s so deep, so intense.

Cassian’s forehead falls to her shoulder when he enters her fully, and his eyes squeeze shut tight. He swallows hard, tightens his arms around her, fears he’ll lose his control at any moment.

When he opens his eyes, Jyn’s are closed. Her face is blank. Relaxed. She is very still.

Cassian has thought of their first time so many different ways. This isn’t one of them. He wanted to lay her down, take care of her. But then, that wouldn’t really be in line with what he knows about Jyn Erso. She is in command here, and he is utterly defenseless against her. He will give her whatever she wants.

As Cassian kisses her shoulder and begins to make love to her, he realizes he has never actually _made love_ to someone, or had someone _make love_ to him. He’s fucked and been fucked, and he’s screwed. He’s had sex and slept with women and taken them to bed. The only time it had been anything but that had been his first time, when he was sixteen – and that was all just fumbling and confusion and the only good memory he had of it. It was probably the same for Jyn. Had any man ever learned how she liked to be touched? Used his mouth and fingers on her to make her cry out in ecstasy? Had she ever _let_ anyone?

Would she even let _Cassian_?

She is a perfect partner for him. She rolls her hips with him, anticipating his every move, and Cassian feels himself nearing his end as he watches her breathe in and out, his mind honing in on her breaths and her chest as it rises and falls. He is so aware of her weight pressing down on him.

Oh, how much _better_ she is than he could ever have imagined.

He wants to make this so good for her. Wants to make himself last so she can experience pleasure, too, not just take it for himself.

He knows he won’t be able to give her what he wants to, what she deserves from a lover. His body is strung too tight now. Already he’s shaking, desperately trying to hold on.

Jyn’s head tips back against the wall. Her fingers clench into his skin. Her body is so, so soft. _“Cassian,”_ she breathes, so quiet he can barely hear it, and that wrenches Cassian’s control away without warning. He barely restrains a curse as he comes, his fingers digging into her flesh way too hard, his teeth biting down on his tongue. No one has _ever_ said his first name during sex – only his last, and not a whisper, not like that.

_Kriff._

He’d ruined it. He’d absolutely ruined it. Just like he knew he would.

* * *

 _The turbolift on Scarif,_ he thinks as another day passes and Jyn gives him a smile when she sees him, her face lit with the displays of the screens in front of her. _Had she known then?_ he wonders.

After they’d made love, he’d gently set her back on the ground and she’d pressed close, wrapped her arms around his neck, and kissed him slowly. It hadn’t been good, he’d known. It was terrible lovemaking. He was a terrible partner. He came too fast. He made it about himself. Surely Jyn had had better, even if her previous partners might have been thoughtless or selfish. At any rate, they’d probably lasted longer than Cassian had.

But she’d dressed and crawled onto his bunk, pulling her legs up to her chest and saying she thought they should probably get something hot to eat. Cassian had nodded, dumbfounded, skittish, unsure of what to do.

All his other partners had just bolted.

And who could blame them? They’d gotten what they’d wanted, and so had he. There was no reason to stick around. Half of them were dead now anyway.

Only this time, he wasn’t filled with more self-loathing. He didn’t feel worse about himself than before he’d sought out a partner. He didn’t feel lonelier, hollower, emptier. He was disappointed in himself, yes, but…mildly satisfied. Emotionally. Even though he’d probably given Jyn a lousy experience, and he had no right to feel the way he did.

They don't talk about it – they aren’t those type of people – in the days that follow. Nothing changes between them, though Cassian wonders more if Jyn knows how he feels about her. At night, alone, his mind replays their moment in his quarters, and he is filled with longing for her again. He wants to give her so much more. If only she will let him.

The nighttime training exercises Jyn had been leading earlier had apparently been a big success, and Draven (surlier than usual in the cold weather) wants her to train some Intelligence agents. After Jyn starts the exercises again, Cassian falls asleep with the hope that she’ll come to his quarters, because it has been over a week since they’d crossed the boundary with their relationship, and he needs to know if things are really, truly all right between them. Jyn seems okay, but she is, like him, a master at disguising her feelings.

The door whispers open, and Cassian is immediately awake and on alert.

“It’s just me,” comes Jyn’s quiet voice, the same thing she says every time she comes to his quarters late at night.

Cassian relaxes, a pleasant warmth unfurling out from his heart and through every part of his body. He watches as Jyn, backlit by the dim light of the icy hallway, takes off her boots. She has already changed into her thermal pajamas.

With a sigh, Jyn sits on the bunk and slides under the covers that Cassian holds open for her.

“Good exercise?” he asks. She moves back a little to fit herself to him, sharing her warmth, and her backside bumps his lap. He inhales sharply through his nose at the contact.

“Yes,” Jyn says sleepily. “Glad it’s over. I’m freezing. More than usual.”

It’s silent, then, though Cassian can almost hear the thundering of his heart. He has to touch her. He can’t bear to have her this close again and _not_ touch her.

He raises his hand and cups her shoulder, presses a kiss to her neck. She doesn’t move. So he continues kissing her neck, and his hips shift against her backside as he lifts up to kiss the side of her neck, as close as he can to her collarbone.

Jyn turns over in the bunk and tangles her legs with his. She buries her face in his chest and breathes out hot against his shirt as she drives her hips up against his. He’s holding her tight as she does it again and he joins her in it, until he can’t stand it any longer and he tilts her face up with his hand so he can kiss her lips. Jyn pushes him onto his back and climbs on top of him, and she moves _hard_ and Cassian groans, his lips breaking from hers as he throws his head back. She’s stripping off her pants and underwear and he wants her to stop and slow down, so he can explore her with his mouth and hands and shatter her in the most beautiful way, but she won’t have that, she won’t have any of that. She lifts off him briefly to push his own pants and underwear down, then takes hold of him and lowers herself onto him. Cassian’s teeth sink into his bottom lip and he grips her hips too hard.

Jyn doesn’t speak. At least not words. She makes sounds, beautiful, beautiful sounds, of pleasure, as she moves on Cassian and he touches her and moves up in her. He wants her naked, he wants hours with her, he wants everything.

He has everything, he realizes. He knows he does. He needs to stop asking for more. Because what more could he have, than Jyn Erso, here, the way she is?

She finishes him with her fingers clenched on one of his shoulders and her head on the other. They doze off that way, until they wake, uncomfortable, and give each other a smile as they readjust.

Jyn’s bare skin is warm against Cassian’s, and he thinks he could sleep like this every night.

* * *

After that, it’s almost impossible for them to be together in public without touching. They’ve never had any concept of personal space, and they’ve always communicated subtly through touch. Now, though, they can’t get enough, and their touch is near constant when they’re near each other. They make it through two days all right, but by mid-afternoon the third day, after leaving a meeting about new encryption for Intel reports, they’re breathless as they hurry through the base’s corridors.

“In here,” Cassian murmurs, pulling Jyn by the arm down a dead-end passageway that’s unlit. He has no clue what it’s for. He just knows that it’s dark and there are a lot of engines and ship parts blocking the entrance from view – and it’s deserted. He and Jyn are at the very back, with snowy walls all around them, when he sweeps Jyn up and hauls her onto an engine. She’s already got her coat off and undoing her belt, and Cassian tugs down her pants and underwear. He undoes his own parka and yanks off Jyn’s boots. She reaches for him, but he’s a trained soldier and easily twists away. He sinks to his knees in the snow, spreads her knees wide for him, and finally takes his chance to kiss her there before she can stop him. Then she’s choking back moans, whimpers, cries, her fingers threading through his hair and her ankles crossed behind his shoulders.

He’s good at this. He knows he is.

Cassian holds her down as she squirms, as her pleasure builds, and he gently pulls it out of her while her nails scrape hard at his scalp. She’s rough and he loves it.

When she stops quaking, he stands and unfastens his pants. They’re together in seconds, her head thrown back, hands behind her gripping the engine for support. Cassian’s arms are posted on either side of her, balancing himself. He can’t go slow now, doesn’t want to go slow, and she doesn’t seem to want it, either. After everything building between them, going slow is not realistic. They need release, both of them.

Cassian loses himself in her. Her body is slipping off the engine toward him, and she’s barely able to keep her voice down. Even though this part of the base is empty, someone could still walk by and they don’t want to be caught.

Cassian is a very private person, but the situation thrills him in a way he never thought possible. Jyn has released something primal in him that he had no idea existed, and he doesn’t know how to tame it and doesn’t even want to. He nips at her shoulder, something he’s never done with another partner, but his head is dizzy and he can’t get enough of her.

Jyn twines her legs around his, steadying herself, and leans up to him. She holds his face and kisses him hard, and she maneuvers him upright. They’re separated for a moment, and Cassian follows Jyn down as she kneels on their discarded coats.

And then she turns around.

He’s had this fantasy, of being behind her and taking her hard, and the thrill of it coming true is about to undo him. He’s grimacing as he feels her again, the pleasure bordering on pain. She reaches behind her, grips his thigh hard, and he groans. They need to be quiet, they’ve _got_ to be quiet, because any minute now someone is going to hear them and catch them fucking on the snow-covered floor for all the galaxy to see.

Cassian’s body burns, and the cold means nothing to him right now. He can hardly even breathe. Jyn’s body warms him, and she’s beautiful, oh, she’s beautiful. Her ecstasy holds him tight and he’s done for. His vision lights up in pure white brilliance like he’s never seen before, and it’s exquisite.

He’ll never be able to control himself around her.

Cassian drapes himself over her back and thinks about the night, when he has no doubt she’ll be in his quarters and they’ll be skin to skin.

He sits on the engine after they’ve finished and redressed, and Jyn straddles his lap, hands curled around his neck.

“I think I’m in love with you,” Jyn whispers, and over ten years of spy training go completely out the window as Cassian’s eyes go wide and his eyebrows jump up. Jyn just smiles and leans her forehead to his.

Cassian slowly smiles back and rubs circles on her back. “I’ve always been,” he says, and the galaxy seems just a little bit brighter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm @thestarbirdfromtheashes on Tumblr!


End file.
